


Summer Go!

by half_rice



Series: You're My 20s [1]
Category: PRISTIN (Band), SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Summer Camp, Cute Kids, M/M, WAHAHAHAHHAHAHA, but still cute kids, i wrote this while possessed man, not their kids, really slow burn, seungcheol thinks he and everyone else is straight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-22
Updated: 2017-09-27
Packaged: 2019-01-04 01:10:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 15,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12158526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/half_rice/pseuds/half_rice
Summary: This is clickbait Up10tion aren’t even here.Seungcheol & Jisoo are the counselors of a dying summer camp for boys that they’ve been going to since they were kids. When the management decide to rent out half the camp to a brand spanking new summer camp for girls, they feel Attacked. Especially by the girls’ camp’s hot counselors, Jeonghan and Nayoung. 90’s Disney TV movie shenanigans ensue between the two camps. And some R rated stuff.Joke.(SVT & Pristin 95 line are adults-ish, everyone else is a gradeschooler)





	1. Shiny Diamonds Camp

**Author's Note:**

> To be clear, Jeonghan, Seungcheo, Jijoo, and Nayoung are 20-ish. Maybe even 21. The rest starting 1996 line are like 10 years old down. Chan and Kyla are 7 - I KNOW THEY WEREn'T BORN IN THE SAME YEAR IM TOO LAZY TO DO MATH.

“Refresh it again!” Seungcheol goes, slamming his hands on the table.

“I literally just did, but like, sure.” Jisoo hits the refresh button for the hundredth time in five minutes.

The webpage regretfully informs them that only 10 boys have signed up for their summer camp.

“What the _hell_?”

Jisoo picks up his laptop to avoid Seungcheol’s attack on the table again.

“I think we’re gonna have to cancel the camp this year, Cheol.” Jisoo sighs.

“Shining Diamond Camp’s been around for 15 years! It’s our childhood, and these kids’ childhood, and we can’t just let it die! Refresh it again!”

Jisoo does, knowing that he’s just loading the exact same page all over again. “Maybe kids just aren’t into summer camps anymore.”

 

“YAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!”

Jisoo dodges the screaming 9-year-old who’s just launched himself onto the bus, skipping all the steps. It was 5 in the morning and he and Seungcheol were picking up the boys on the way to what was looking like the final year of their summer camp. With only ten (10) boys paying the fees, he and Seungcheol had had to use their own money to rent the bus, print the t-shirts they were wearing, and buy enough food for a month, but the happy, screaming faces of the boys were worth it. Sort of.

“Morning, Soonyoung, did you have pure sugar for breakfast?”

“YEEEAAAAAAHHHH!” Soonyoung screams, climbing over the seats on all fours to the back row.

Jisoo checks _Kwon Soonyoung_ off the list on his phone. “We’re just waiting for two more.” He calls to Seungcheol.

“WHAT UP PAAARTY PEOPLE?” Seungcheol jumps onto the bus carrying the last two boys on either shoulder like sacks of rice, and all the boys cheer. Jisoo doesn’t even bother trying to understand how they fit through the door. Seungcheol plugs his phone into the aux cord and plays an outdated beat.

“HAS EVERYONE PUT THEIR STUFF IN THE TRUNK?” Seungcheol raps into a megaphone Jisoo had wished he’d left at home.

“YEAH!”

“HAS EVERYONE GOT THEIR SEATBELTS ON?”

“YEAH!”

“DOES ANYONE NEED TO PEE?”

“NO!”

“Wait! I do!” A loud voice shouts from the back.

All the boys complain as Seokmin scrambles to the front of the bus, stepping on Wonwoo’s and Hansol’s feet in the process, wailing “Excuse me!” every other second like a human siren.

Jisoo plopped into one of the front seats, beside Jihoon, who’s claimed a seat near the front to avoid the party in the back.

“What happened to the other boys who went last summer?” Jisoo asks.

Jihoon pulls one earbud out. “Summer classes.”

“What like, required by the school?”

“No. Their parents wanted them to study this year’s subjects ahead.”

“What?” Jisoo frowns. “ _Why_?”

Jihoon shrugs.

 

“I think we’re lost.” Seungcheol says, pulling up onto the side of the gravelly road.

“Jisooooo.” Seungcheol shakes Jisoo awake. “Can you check the GPS?”

“We’ve been going here for 10 years, Cheol, we don’t need GPS.”

“Jisoo, _look_.”

Jisoo blinks awake, and follows Seungcheol’s line of sight to a large wooden arch that’s recently been painted white. As his eyes come into focus, he reads _Pristin Summer Camp For Girls_ painted in neat purple cursive. Pink and yellow stars hang from the curve of the arch, spinning around in the strong mountain wind.

Jisoo looks around. The trees, the road, the broken fence across the street – everything else is just as they were last summer. “No, this is the right place.”

“What the hell is going on?” Seungcheol pulls the bus sharply in through the archway, waking all the boys.

The cabins, which line either side of the dirt road leading up to the open field and lake, were supposed to be a sad kind of mottled green. The grass was supposed to be dangerously overgrown around the cabins, and the dirt road was supposed to be muddy and ridden with dangerously deep potholes.

Instead, the cabins were all a fresh white with light yellow and pink curtains hanging in the windows – which had new insect screens installed. The grass was trimmed and peppered with what looked like little white flowers, and the road was paved as smooth as a city avenue.

“What. The. Hell.” Seungcheol stomps on the brakes. Everyone and their backpacks slam into whatever’s in front of them.

“Language, Cheol.”

Seungcheol slams the door open and tells the boys to go down, and when Mingyu asks if they bring their bags with them, Seungcheol says, “Of course, this is _our_ camp!” through clenched teeth.

Two people come out of the nearest cabin as they’re unloading everything from the bus. Jisoo sees them first, because Seungcheol is busy carrying an entire kayak on his own, much to the amazement of Hansol and Chan. And the minute Jisoo sees them, he knows they’re in trouble.

“Hi, who’s in charge here?” The girl goes, crossing her arms. She’s all tanned legs and white shorts, and a judgy pout that’s starting to convince Jisoo he might be straighter than he thinks.

“Me,” Jisoo squeaks, wondering where his voice had gone. “I mean, me and him. I’m Jisoo, and that’s Seungcheol. We’re in charge. Of the camp. Us.” He motions to Seungcheol, who is now carrying two kayaks, one under each arm.

“Hi. Okay, I’m Nayoung, and this is Jeonghan, and we’re the counselors around here, and-”

“We’re gonna have to ask you to leave.” The guy beside the Queen of Long Legs cuts in. Jisoo’s too distracted to give this guy a nickname in his head. He’s beautiful, and his pretty, narrowed eyes and pink lips are pulled into three disapproving lines as he watches Seungcheol carry four backpacks, one giggling Hansol, and a screaming Chan.

He turns back to Jisoo. “This isn’t a public campground, so you guys are gonna have to haul your shit elsewhere.”

“I, uh, w-we…” Jisoo stutters.

“Take cabins 1 and 2, we won’t need the others,” Seungcheol instructs the boys, who start dragging their things on the road.

“Hey, stop.” Jeonghan holds out an arm to stop Seungcheol. He flashes him a stretched smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. “How do I put this nicely? Get the hell out of my camp.”

“The hell I will.” Seungcheol says, giving him a gummy grin.

“Language.” Jisoo and Nayoung sigh.

 

“Girls, these are the boys of Shiny Diamond Camp-”

“ _Shining_ Diamond Camp.” Seungcheol corrects. He’s got his arms folded and his underbite jutting out and Jisoo is praying he doesn’t do anything stupid. The boys are clumped tightly around the two older boys, looking warily at the girls neatly lined up a few meters away.

“Whatever.” Pristin’s handsome counselor doesn’t even look at Seungcheol. “We’re gonna let them stay in cabin 8 for the next three weeks. Please do your best to be kind to them make them feel welcome.”

“In _our own camp_ ,” Seungcheol mutters under his breath.

“And I’m sure that they, in turn, will be polite, quiet, well-behaved, and not bothersome.”

“Those aren’t even parallel.” Jisoo mutters.

A short girl with messy brown hair raises her hand.

“Yes, Eunwoo?”

“But what if they do bother us?”

“If any of them _do_ bother you, feel free to tell either myself or Nayoung-eonnie and we’ll make sure that they don’t bother you again.”

Jisoo can’t help but make a face.

“Anyone else have any questions?”

Seungcheol raises his hand before Jisoo can stop him. Not that Jisoo could physically stop Seungcheol, a human meatloaf, from doing anything.

“What. Do. You. Want.” Jeonghan’s fake smile cracks.

“We’re going to need another cabin. Nobody’s in cabin 7-”

“You’re going to need to make do. We’re using cabin 7 as the arts and crafts room. Speaking of which, it’s arts and crafts time, so let’s go to cabin 7 everybody.” Jisoo’s afraid Seungcheol is going to strangle the girls’ counselor. “Everybody except you guys, of course.”

 

Jisoo walks into cabin 8 to find the boys squished dejectedly on three bunk beds. Seungcheol’s sitting on one of the lower bunks, tapping his foot like he’s trying to drill a hole in the floor.

“C’mon guys, this is still gonna be fun. We’ve just got to, um, stay out of the other camp’s way, but otherwise, this is gonna be just like last summer.” They all stare at the desperate thumbs up Jisoo gives them.

“Last summer we had one bed each.” Seungkwan mutters.

“In real camping there are no beds at all, so this is still…pretty good.” Jisoo waggles his thumbs. “Ish…”

Seungcheol claps his hands suddenly, making everyone jump. “Who wants to play soccer?”

“Great idea, Cheol.” Jisoo grins.

Seungcheol brings out the soccerball and a permanent marker. The boys gather around him, watching intently. Jisoo tries to see what his co-counselor is doing, but Mingyu’s gotten too tall over the school year and all he sees is the top of Mingyu’s head.

“Why are you writing on the ball, Cheol-hyung?” Mingyu asks, frowning.

“He’s not writing, he’s drawing something.” Wonwoo says, pushing up his glasses to see better.

Seungcheol holds up the ball, which now has a familiar-looking sneering face with soft bangs swept to one side.

“Cheol, that’s _rude_.” Jisoo purses his lips.

“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. Let’s go, boys!”

Seungcheol leads the boys out into the burning summer sunshine. They haven’t even started and everyone’s already soaked their shirts through with sweat, but these boys would follow Seungcheol off a cliff. Jisoo pulls his shirt away from his back, fanning himself with its hem.

Seungcheol directs the bigger boys to pick up large fallen branches, and he’s pushing them down into the dirt to make goal posts when a shrill whistle rings from across the field.

“Hey! What the hell are you doing!” Jeonghan’s walking towards them, and they all kind of stop because he looks like he brisk walked right out of a commercial for some fresh water or something. He isn’t a sweaty mess, and his bangs, like his mini-me the soccer ball, are still perfectly swept to one side.

“We’re making goalposts.” Seungcheol says, going back to pushing the branches into the ground. “For soccer.”

“I’m gonna have to ask you to not make any giant holes in the field.” Jeonghan says, pulling one of the branches out. “The girls could trip over them.”

“If they’re giant holes then the girls should see them-” Seungkwan says, and Jisoo pulls the 8-year-old towards him, clamping a hand gently over his mouth.

“Ha ha, Seungkwan, you’re _so_ silly.” Jisoo goes.

Jeonghan ignores them. “I want you guys to take these out and put those branches back wherever you found them. I’m sure you can play soccer without these.”

“Do you even know how soccer works?” Seungcheol replaces the branch that Jeonghan took away.

“Yeah, all you need is the…” Jeonghan picks up the ball. “Ball.”

Hansol snorts, then Seokmin giggles, then all the boys burst out laughing at Jeonghan looking at his face in the soccer ball. Jisoo wants to die, and take Seungcheol with him.

“Real mature.” Jeonghan drops the ball. “Maybe you should hold your own arts & crafts class sometime.”

“Maybe I will.” Seungcheol snaps back, and Jisoo shoots him a look like _What_?

“Also, I’m gonna need you guys to clear the field, we’re going to have a frisbee championship in,” Jeonghan checks his watch. “Ten minutes.”

“That’s enough for one round.” Seungcheol goes, clapping his hands together. “Come on guys, two teams let’s go let’s go!”

Seungcheol gathers the boys in a circle, puts his hand in, and all of them follow suit. They look expectantly at Jisoo, who sighs and puts his hand in the circle.

“SHINING DIAMONDS YEAH!”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes.

_

Jeonghan rolls over, ripping his blanket off. For the sixth day straight, he’d sweated all the way through his shirt and shorts, because for the sixth day straight, Nayoung had steadied the one electric fan at herself. That bitch.

He picks up his phone and finds that there’s still no reception.

He’s about to roll over and sleep when he hears high-pitched talking from outside his cabin.

Jeonghan picks up his phone again. _10:09 pm_. He wants to go back to sleep but kids drowning in the lake in the middle of the night are a headache he doesn’t want to deal with.

He groans as he slides out of bed.

“Hey!” He shouts, stomping his towel slippers through the dewy grass. Some kids get caught in the beam of his flashlight and freeze, like they’re about to be run over. “Curfew was two hours ago!”

Jeonghan rubs his eyes, suddenly remembering that he’d forgotten his glasses. “Get back into your cabins!”

“We’re sorry!” A voice he doesn’t recognize shouts back.

The kids are now holding their hands up, and they don’t look like any of the girls in his camp. “We didn’t know!”

Jeonghan squints. Oh. They’re boys.

“They’re with me.” Someone says from behind Jeonghan.

Seungcheol shades his eyes when Jeonghan turns around, flashlight and all, to face him.

“We don’t need to follow your curfew.”

“Well, I’ll just go back to sleep now so I won’t be responsible for any shit that happens to you guys,” Jeonghan brushes past Seungcheol.

Jeonghan hears Seungcheol and the four boys flop onto the grass behind him.

“You can’t see the stars from the city because the other lights are too bright.” Seungcheol says lazily.

“What’s that constellation, hyung?”

“That over there is the bear…”

Jeonghan frowns. He’s pretty sure that neither of the Ursas are visible at this time.

“…playing basketball.”

“Oh! I see the hoop!”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes. The guy’s an idiot, and these kids are all going to end up like him. Not that he cares.

Five minutes later Jeonghan’s lying on the grass between Minghao and Wonwoo, pointing out the different planets and universally accepted constellations.

“So it’s _not_ a bear playing basketball?” Minghao asks.

“No.” Jeonghan says flatly.

“But it could be, if you want it to be.” Seungcheol says.

“No, that’s not how it works.”

“So, who says when constellations are real and when they’re not real?” Wonwoo asks.

Jeonghan frowns up at the stars. “Uh…”

“Jeonghan does.” Seungcheol stretches out, and Vernon sleepily crawls into the crook of his arm.

“No, these constellations were named by the Ancient Greeks, and then everyone agreed to follow them.”

Wonwoo and Minghao nod like they’re in class.

“Is your favorite word ‘No’?” Seungcheol asks, turning to face Jeonghan.

“No-” Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “Fuck.”

Seungcheol laughs, shaking Vernon’s and Jun’s sleeping heads on either arm.

“Jeonghan-hyung said a bad word.” Jun mutters, snuggling his nose into Seungcheol’s arm.

“I’m an adult, adults can say bad words.” Jeonghan says.

“Bull-shit.” Minghao says sagely.


	2. FIIIIREEEE (eh oh eh oh)

“Look, we’re not asking you to follow a whole book of rules like the other camp is, but you can _not_ put bugs in their shoes while they sleep.” Jisoo rubs his temples. He was starting to get migraines at the ripe age of 20. He’d had to get the boys in a cabin huddle for the fourth time in the one week they’d been there. Where was Seungcheol? Why did he have to do all the lecturing and chiding? Is this how his mom felt? “Why would you even put bugs into people’s shoes?”

“Because it’s funny.” Soonyoung shrugs.

“It’s not our fault they put a lizard in our bathroom!” Mingyu whines. Tears come to Seokmin’s eyes just thinking about that night he’d reached out to grab the bar of soap just to find the soap squirming in his hand. He threw the “soap” on reflex, and it landed on Soonyoung, who threw it to Hansol, who screamed and threw it to Jihoon, who threw it onto the wall, where Wonwoo stared at it until Jun plucked it off and threw it to Minghao, who promptly threw the poor creature out the window.

“It wasn’t a lizard, it was a newt.” Wonwoo corrects him.

“Hmph.” Mingyu pouts.

“We had to avenge ourselves.” Jihoon says quietly.

“We don’t even know that it was them, maybe that poor lizard crawled-” Jisoo stops. “What did you say, Wonwoo?”

“Newt. It’s a newt.”

“Right. Maybe the _newt_ crawled in through the window, and it’s nobody’s fault.”

“It was Siyeon and Kyulkyung’s fault.” Jihoon says.

“Jihoon is our spy.” Chan says.

“They planned the whole thing during lunch and did it while we were out swimming.” Minghao cracks his knuckles.

Jisoo wanted to say something, but he didn’t feel like Jihoon would lie about something like that, but he also felt he ought to stop them from spying on the girls for _several_ reasons, but he didn’t know how to even begin-

Seungcheol slams the door to the cabin open. “I hate them. I hate their whole camp. We have to get rid of them.”

The boys cheer.

“I don’t even want to ask.” Jisoo sighs.

“They won’t let us have a campfire because it’s a fire hazard!” Seungcheol throws his hands, and Jisoo narrowly dodges death by Seungcheol’s backhand. “OF COURSE THAT’S WHAT A FUCKING FIRE DOES!”

“Cheol-hyung said a bad word.” Jun says, raising his eyebrows.

“Yeah, he did, and he should calm down before he says any more.” Jisoo says pointedly.

“His Highness told me to go and sing around a flashlight! A FLASHLIGHT!”

“Won’t that hurt our eyes?” Seungkwan asks.

“And our souls, Seungkwan. Nobody sings around a flashlight. Nobody.” Seungcheol pounds a fist against his chest.

“So, where are we gonna sing?” Seokmin asks, more concerned with not having anywhere to sing.

“Around a campfire, if it’s the last thing I do.” Seungcheol says through his teeth.

 

“You’re so cool, Cheol-hyung.” Soonyoung breathes, watching Seungcheol throw more wood onto the measly fire in the pit he and Mingyu built.

“I still think this is a bad idea.” Jisoo’s got Chan, Seungkwan, and Hansol squished on either side of him to keep them away from the fire. The rest of the boys are all standing too close, the bright orange light glinting off their eyes and the crispy bits of soot getting in them. “What if they-”

“They’re not the boss of us.” Seungcheol fans the fire, and it coughs a bit before rising about a foot higher. The boys all gasp, then cough out the smoke they inhaled.

“Hyu- Hyung’s the coolest,” Soonyoung wheezes.

Seungcheol beams as he sits down on one of the fallen trees he’d rolled over as benches. “Jisoo, some tunes please.”

Jisoo sighs and gives his guitar a few experimental strums. “ _Today was gonna be the day…_ ”

Seungcheol shoots him a frown and Jisoo goes, “Joking. I was joking.”

A few songs later, four of which were Seungkwan’s personal requests, Jisoo was starting to feel a bit warm. It was a warm night to begin with, and the fire was getting pretty tall – Not quite Mingyu tall, but already way over Chan’s 7-year-old head. The other boys have backed away onto the fallen trees, except Soonyoung and Minghao, whom Jisoo felt had a future in fire breathing and arson, respectively.

“Hey, Cheol?”

“Mm-hm?” Cheol’s roasting four marshmallows on sticks in either hand, with Hansol sleeping soundly in his lap.

“It’s getting kinda late.”

“We don’t have a curfew.” Seungcheol says, biting into a hot marshmallow as he hands out the others.

“I mean,” Jisoo felt sweat drip down his nose. “The fire’s getting big, we should put it out a little.”

“Don’t worry, I got it under cont-”

Before Seungcheol could finish his sentence, a huge gust of wind knocks the logs over and starts them rolling towards Seungcheol and Jisoo.

“THE FIRE’S WALKING!!!” Seokmin screams as the boys scurry out of the way of the rolling, flaming logs.

“CHEOL, THE KIDS!” Jisoo drops his guitar and picks up as many boys as he could carry (exactly one Chan), while Seungcheol throws the marshmallows and picks up as many boys as _he_ could carry (one Hansol, one Seokmin, and one Seungkwan). They herd the rest of the boys away from the fire, which is beginning to eat into the fallen trees they’d been using as benches.

And Jisoo’s guitar.

“NO!” Jisoo almost drops Chan, watching his guitar crackle and twang as the fire chews it up.

Soon the guitar is long gone and they can only watch the fire get taller and taller, and it’s just a few meters away from licking the canopy of trees when another gust of wind comes flying in.

This time it’s in the form of a giant, faded tarpaulin that reads _Shining Diamonds Camp_ , thrown by an exasperated-looking Jeonghan. Nobody says anything as Jeonghan kicks more dirt over the now dying embers, smothering the fire out completely.

“There’s no nice way to put this but,” Jeonghan swipes his sweaty bangs to the side. “I fucking told you so.”

Jisoo looks over to Seungcheol still carrying Hansol, Seokmin, and Seungkwan, and he’s ready for whatever shit Seungcheol is gonna spit out of that underbite.

“Sorry.” Seungcheol says, lowering his head.

Minghao runs to hug Jeonghan. “Thank you for saving our lives, hyung.”

The rest of the boys follow, forming a sweaty puppy pile around Jeonghan, who rolls his eyes before grudgingly pats Minghao on the back.

“That’s enough stupid things for one night, everybody go to sleep.” Jeonghan says, breaking out of the hug and walking away.

Jisoo looks back at Seungcheol, who doesn’t say anything.

“Okay, you heard him, everyone wash up and go to bed.” Jisoo says, nudging the boys – Seungcheol included – towards the cabin.

 

It’s a little past midnight that day, and Jeonghan lays in bed in a fresh set of pajamas, watching the water stains in the ceiling. Not that they were moving, he was just watching them.

He rolls over and looks at Nayoung’s sleeping form, basking in the one electric fan’s wind. That bitch.

He watches her chest rise and fall a few times, and when he’s sure she’s asleep he gets up and reaches into his backpack. He digs around until his nails clink against glass, and pulls out a lukewarm bottle of soju. In the faint light from outside he can read his own handwriting on the bottle telling him _FOR EMERGENCIES ONLY, why are you like this_.

Jeonghan leaves his flashlight behind as he creeps out of the cabin, looking around before he settles onto the cool grass beside it.

Jeonghan’s a few shots in and still not sleepy when he hears something rustle nearby. He closes the bottle and tucks it into his shorts waistband.

“Hey,” A dejected voice says. “Can’t sleep?”

“Can’t sleep.” Jeonghan says, shuffling a bit to completely cover the shape of the bottle.

“Can I sit with you or do you want me to go…?”

“Sure.” At this moment Jeonghan feels his soul leave his body and watch the rest of this mess from afar, shaking its head. “I mean, sure you can stay here.”

Seungcheol dumps himself onto the grass beside Jeonghan. The latter shuffles to hide the bottle completely, but Seungcheol’s too…glum to notice. He appears to have shrunken, if that was possible, and is slouched into a ball, hugging his legs as he fidgets with the grass.

Seungcheol sighs, and it’s the most pitiful thing Jeonghan’s ever heard.

Jeonghan shifts to face the cabin a bit more.

Seungcheol sighs again.

If he does that one more time…

Seungcheol sighs.

“Look, it’s not your fault- I mean, it _is_ your fault we burned ten square meters of forest down because you didn’t listen to me when I told you not to do it, but nobody got hurt and that’s what matters.” Jeonghan shoves it all out in one breath.

Seungcheol’s quiet, and Jeonghan’s afraid he’s going to sigh again.

“Do you want some soju.” Jeonghan says, pulling the bottle out from under his shirt.

Seungcheol frowns. “Huh?”

“Do you want a drink? I don’t have glasses or anything, so-”

Seungcheol looks at the bottle. “Is that even…allowed?”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “Of course not. Do you want some?”

“Yes, please.”

Seungcheol takes a swig straight from the bottle before Jeonghan can ask him to drink from the cap. Jeonghan stares against his own will.

“Here.” Seungcheol holds the bottle out to him. “Thanks.”

Jeonghan blinks.

“Uh, yeah.” Jeonghan drinks straight from the bottle, which is a lot lighter. There isn’t enough left to get drunk, and that bottle was supposed to last him the whole month of summer camp. Stupid fucking Seungcheol and his stupid cute face and meaty body he’s now laying onto the grass and you know what, whatever.

Jeonghan lays on the grass next to Seungcheol.

“What star is that?” Seungcheol asks, pointing at the sky. Jeonghan doesn’t even have his glasses or his contacts on, and he hasn’t checked his stargazing app in days. He squints at the dot in the sky, which looks like every other dot in the sky.

“It’s not a star. It’s Mars.”

“Oh.” Seungcheol smiles sleepily at him, his eyelashes brushing the top of his cheeks. “You’re so smart.”

It was Venus.


	3. So I heard the ISACs were cancelledt

“Hey _Jijoo_ ,” Nayoung leans on a post on the pier, resting her chin in her hands. Jisoo’s treading the water in the deeper part of the lake, making sure none of the kids go past him.

“It’s Jisoo.”

“I know, I’m not an idiot.” Nayoung makes a face. “Do you have a minute?”

“Yeah, sure.” Jisoo says, without taking his eyes off Hansol, who’s diving for something Seungkwan saw on the lake floor but couldn’t reach.

Nayoung drops her shorts and shirt onto the pier and dives in, perfect form. Jisoo doesn’t even blink. She surfaces. Gay. He’s definitely gay.

“So I was thinking that before World War 3 breaks out between the k-i-d-s,” Nayoung says, getting her feet steady on the mossy dirt.

“We can spell, you know.” Seungkwan says.

“That’s great.” Nayoung shoots him a quick smile before turning back to Jisoo. “We should direct their energy to something more productive, like an inter-camp sports championship.”

“Hansol, stay in the shallow part,” Jisoo guides him back. “So like, boys vs girls?”

“Yup.”

“Soonyoung do _not_ drown Chan!” Jisoo picks up a sputtering Chan and lets him ride on his back. “Won’t that make things worse, though?”

“A little competition never hurt anyone, Jijoo.” Nayoung shrugs, gently pushing a turtle-floating Jun back towards the shore.

“Uh, yeah it does.” Jisoo adjusts Chan’s arms so he doesn’t strangle him. “Well, it’s unfair from the start ‘cause you have thirty girls and we only have ten guys, and Seungcheol’s gonna take this too seriously like he always does when it comes to sports-”

“Are you scared… _Jijoo_?” Nayoung taunts.

“It’s Ji _soo_.” Jisoo’s got daggers shooting out of his eyes. “And it’s on.”

 

Seungcheol jumps out of his nap when Jisoo slams the cabin door open. “We have to take them down.”

“Hey, that’s my line.” Seungcheol rubs his eyes.

“That annoying Nayoung woman won’t stop calling me Jijoo like I’m a fucking baby and now she wants this stupid inter-camp sport thinq-”

“Hold up, like a boys vs girls _competition_?” Seungcheol’s eyes sparkle, and Jisoo realizes he’s awoken a beast he hasn’t seen since Seungcheol nearly killed him seven years ago over tug-o-war.

“Y- yes…”

“What sports?”

“I don’t know, we haven’t talked about that yet…”

“Well, ask her.”

“Why don’t _you_ ask her?”

“You’re the one she likes.” Seungcheol shrugs.

“She doesn’t- Does she?” Jisoo’s brows are furrowed, trying to remember every interaction he’s ever had with that obnoxious counselor. “Like _like_ like? Or just like…like?”

“You’ve lost me, man.”

 

There’s one picnic table per cabin, so for every meal the entire Shining Diamonds Camp has been squeezed onto one table, with Jisoo and Seungcheol standing up, glaring at Jeonghan and Nayoung’s mostly empty table.

“Hey, guys, come sit with us.” Nayoung calls, waving towards the other counselors.

The kids stare as Jisoo and Seungcheol awkwardly and carefully walk towards the picnic table across the space, like they’re afraid of stepping on a bear trap.

Jisoo waits for Seungcheol to sit down first before gently lowering his ass onto the bench.

“We won’t bite.” Nayoung grins, watching the boys squirm, Jeonghan included. He’s turned to face the lake like he’s concentrating on trying to find a monster in it.

“Jisoo told me you want our camps to go up against each other.” Seungcheol places his spoon down loudly. “What sport?”

“Well, it’s got to be non-contact for obvious reasons. So, maybe a relay race...” Nayoung says. “And dodgeball.”

“Game. We have a soccer ball.” Seungcheol’s smile rides up to his gums.

“We know.” Jeonghan mutters.

 

“I know Jisoo here’s been telling you that it’s bad to take revenge on the girls-”

“Because it _is_.” Jisoo folds his arms, still squinting under the shade of his cap. It’s like Nayoung cut a deal with the sun to be extra hot and extra bright on the day she and Seungcheol agreed on for the Inter-Camp Olympics. He wouldn’t put it past her.

“But that’s because you were going about it all wrong. There’s a time and place for revenge, and This. Is. It.” Seungcheol slams a fist into his hand hard enough that it ruffles Jihoon’s bangs. “We’re going to take them down so hard they’re gonna regret even stepping foot on _our_ camp.”

Hansol raises his hand. “I thought we’re not supposed to hit girls?”

“You’re not going to.” Jisoo says. “Nobody’s hitting anyone today.”

“ _Unless_ they hit first.” Seungcheol says.

“No, nobody’s going to hit anyone else or we’re sending them home, okay?” Jisoo grumbles but everyone ignores him.

“Here’s the game plan: Mingyu, you’ve got the longest legs so you’re definitely in the relay race. Jun, Soonyoung, and Chan, if you guys run fast enough you all get candy.”

“Cheol.”

“No, you know what, get candy now, here,” Seungcheol hands each of the kids a toffee to chew on.

“Cheol!”

“Minghao, I want you on the dodgeball team, along with Soonyoung again, Hansol, Seokmin, Seungkwan, and Jihoon.”

Jisoo opens his mouth to protest throwing all of their 8-year-olds into dodgeball, but Wonwoo speaks first.

“What about me?” Wonwoo asks.

“You’re asthmatic so you and Jisoo are gonna be cheerleaders today. I need you to be louder than Seokmin, got it?” Cheol shoots two aggressive thumbs up at Wonwoo, who frowns.

“Louder than _Seokmin_?”

“Great, good job, come on team!” Seungcheol puts his hand down, and all the boys, confused Wonwoo included, scramble to put their hands in the circle. Jisoo sighs and puts his in as well.

“SHINING DIAMONDS YEAH!”

 

Jeonghan blows his whistle.

Yuha and Mingyu, the two tallest kids in both camps, start out at the same pace, but Mingyu does this strangely graceful leap-skip and gets ahead.

“What’s he doing?” Jisoo frowns.

“Whatever, it works.” Cheol cups his hands around his mouth. “GO GYUUUUUU!”

Yehana gets the lead over Chan, who’s running as fast as he can but has really short, stubby legs. It’s like watching a golden retriever trot calmly past a hyperactive corgi.

Chan rolls to a stop when he passes the stick to Soonyoung. Jisoo runs over to check on him. The kid is sweating and panting heavily, his face his pink, but he puts up a thumbs up with a stony face and says, “I’m good.”

“NINJAAAAAA DAAAAAAAAASSSHHHH!” Soonyoung howls as he Naruto-dashes his way to the lead. Sungyeon just kind of slows down to avoid him, covering her ears.

“Oh god,” Jisoo says, pulling his cap down in embarrassment.

“GOOOOOOOO SOOOOONYOOOOUUUNNNNGG!” Cheol screams at the top of his lungs, his face getting a bit red.

Jisoo pulls his cap lower.

Jun’s got perfect form as he waits for Soonyoung to hand him the stick, but when he leaps forward into a weirdly slow trot-gallop hybrid Jisoo wants to bury himself in a hole. Sungyeon hands Pristin’s stick to Kyla, whose eyes light up immediately. Jisoo can hardly keep track of the little white blur that is Kyla, suspecting that Pristin’s counselors had also given the tiny kids candy.

Seungcheol rolls in the dirt when they lose, and Jisoo kind of drags him onto his feet. “Look.”

Nayoung’s got a tote bag slung on her shoulder, and she’s pulling out piece after piece of candy and handing it out to the girls, congratulating them. Jeonghan’s rolling his eyes, offering them water instead.

“Damn it we don’t have that much candy.” Seungcheol’s got his underbite out again.

Jeonghan wipes Kyla’s face with a damp towel, trying to make her cheeks a little less strawberry pink. “They aren’t gonna be able to sleep later if you keep giving them candy.”

“They aren’t gonna be able to sleep for weeks if they lose to the boys, right girls?” Nayoung calls out.

“YEAH!”

 

Jeonghan and Jisoo use string from the arts and crafts room to mark out the area for dodgeball, and Nayoung and Seungcheol use oil pastels to draw lines on their kids’ faces like candy colored warpaint.

Jisoo’s looking out at the two lines of kids with their teeth bared. “This isn’t gonna end well.”

“For you guys, maybe.” Jeonghan holds out a water bottle. “Water?”

“Thanks.”

The game itself is actually more civil than Jisoo expected, with the kids hurling Jeonghan the soccer ball at each other and jumping out of the way peacefully. That is, until Seungkwan screams out, and the Certified First Aider in Jisoo switches on.

Jeonghan blows his whistle.

“What happened?” Jisoo asks, running over.

Seungkwan holds up his arm, where there’s a distinct reddish dotted-line circle. “EUNWOO BIT ME!”

Eunwoo shakes her pigtails. “DID NOT!”

“DID TOO! WHAT’S THIS, THEN?” Seungkwan waves his arm at her, and she makes another biting motion so he snaps it back. “HYUUUUNG SHE TRIED TO DO IT AGAIN!”

Jeonghan looks at Seungkwan’s arm closely. “It didn’t break skin, so you’ll be fine.”

“She _bit_ him, Jeonghan.” Jisoo goes. “Shouldn’t we make her sit out or something?”

“There are no rules like that in dodgeball.” Nayoung says, suddenly between Jeonghan and Jisoo.

“Yeah, they can just play on.” Jeonghan shrugs. “No more biting, okay, Eunwoo?”

“But I didn’t do it.”

“Are you serious-” Jisoo starts, but Jeonghan blows his whistle.

Seungcheol’s making crazy arm gestures at Jisoo that the latter doesn’t even want to try to understand as he walks towards him.

“She should be benched!” Seungcheol shouts. “She bit someone!”

“No need to shout, Cheol, I’m right beside you.”

“Why are they the referees? Of course they’re gonna win!”

“Calm down, Cheol.”

“This is me still calm you haven’t seen not-calm Cheol!” Seungcheol’s face was already red from the heat, and now he looks like a ripe chili pepper.

“Uh, yeah, I have.”

 

Eunwoo doesn’t bite anyone else, but she does take down Seungkwan, before being taken down by Hansol who’s shouting something about avenging Seungkwan. Jisoo wonders who even taught them that word. Oh, right. Iron Man and friends.

Roa gets tired and switches out with Rena, who proceeds to take down Seokmin and Soonyoung before Minghao takes her out. Minghao then sweeps the rest of the girls on the field, leaving just himself, Rena, Siyeon, and Jihoon. Everyone had forgotten Jihoon was even still there until he threw the ball, and in one throw took out Rena and Minghao.

“But we’re teammates!” Minghao shouts as Jisoo half-drags him off the field.

“I’m on my own team.” Jihoon says flatly.

Siyeon and Jihoon square each other down while Nayoung and Seungcheol cheer loudly from the sides, as if they’d birthed the two themselves. Jisoo and Jeonghan exchange mutually embarrassed looks.

“YOU’RE GOING DOWN!” Siyeon screams over at Jihoon.

Jihoon rolls his eyes and calmly throws the ball, hitting Siyeon squarely in the face.

The latter starts crying, and Jihoon walks off the field, ignoring the flood of cheering boys coming at him.

“JIHOON IS THE BEST!” Soonyoung starts. “JIHOON! JIHOON! JIHOON!”

“JIHOON! JIHOON! JIHOON!”

Mingyu and Jun carry the small boy on their shoulders, bouncing him around until Mingyu sneezes and drops Jihoon onto Jun. They both fall onto Soonyoung, still cheering.

Seungcheol comes in and lifts Jihoon, Lion King style. The boys make various animal noises and jump around, still on a sugar high and the satisfaction of defeating their mortal enemies.

 

Nayoung’s got her arms folded, watching them from across the field. “They’re so extra.”

Jeonghan’s got an arm around Siyeon, checking her little nose for any damage. It’s still turned up and not bleeding, so she should be fine. “It’s okay, Siyeonnie, we won the first round anyway.”

“We need a clincher.” Nayoung taps her foot. “Don’t worry, Siyeonnie, we’re not done beating them yet.”

“Okay, eonnie.” Siyeon sniffles.

Jeonghan looks down the line of girls with cuts and bruises from the dodgeball game and looks back at Nayoung. “I think we’ve had enough for the day, Nayoung.”

“Nonsense.” She jogs over to the boys’ side of the field. “Hey _Jijoo_!”

“Jisoo-hyung, it’s your girlfriend.” Seungkwan says, snickering.

“She’s not. My girlfriend.” Jisoo sighs.

“We need one last match.” His not-girlfriend says, flipping her hair. “We can’t leave it at 1-1.”

“We get to pick the sport.” Seungcheol asks.

“Not soccer. Please.” Nayoung groans.

“I wasn’t gonna say soccer.” Seungcheol’s eyes are on fire. “Tug-o-war.”

 

They manage to find a really thick rope in one of the cabins, probably from the time that there were more boats on the lake. It’s actually the _same_ rope from that one summer that Seungcheol nearly killed Jisoo during tug-o-war, still marked with electric tape and a few drips of dried blood.

“What are these stains?” Jeonghan rubs at them with his hands.

“Mine.” Jisoo sighs, and Jeonghan frowns at him.

They line up eight of the Pristin girls against eight of the boys – Wonwoo’s constructed a little Shining Diamonds flag at this point and is waving it around like crazy, and both sets of counselors agreed to let Kyla and Chan sit it out.

“This is a bad idea.” Jisoo says.

“That’s what losers say.” Nayoung cups her hands around her mouth. “DRAG THEM THROUGH THE DIRT, GIRLS!”

“LET THEM EAT GRASS, BOYS!” Seungcheol shouts from Nayoung’s other side.

Jeonghan blows his whistle, and immediately all the kids’ faces get red from the effort of trying to drag the other team through the dirt or force them to eat grass.

The kids are screaming loud enough to be heard from the moon, and Seungcheol and Nayoung are even louder. It’s pretty much an even fight, with the rope barely twitching from one side to the other, and it’s looking like the rope is gonna give way before any of the kids do.

That is, until Mingyu, who up till this moment has not told anyone he’s allergic to grass, sneezes.

The Shining Diamonds boys topple over and get dragged through the dirt, until Sungyeon trips and sends the girls crashing like dominoes. Both sides lie groaning on the grass, and it’s quiet until Jeonghan remembers to blow his whistle.

Mingyu sneezes again. And again. And onto Jun, who makes a face as he wipes Mingyu’s sneeze off his hair and onto Soonyoung in front of him.

“Is everyone okay?” Jisoo asks, jogging over.

Chan walks up and down the line of groaning boys and reports back to Jisoo with a thumbs up that he turns sideways. “They’ll survive.”

 

Dinnertime is quiet as both camps hold their few ice cubes against their bruises and blow on their scraped knees and elbows. Thankfully, nobody’s seriously injured, except maybe Kyulkyung, whose middle finger popped out of its socket. Jeonghan popped it back in before it started hurting, and Eunwoo, who was watching, threw up.

“Hey guys,” Nayoung calls to Jisoo and Seungcheol, who are eating by the boys’ table, standing up. She motions for them to come over.

Jisoo’s about to sit beside Jeonghan when Nayoung looks at him pointedly and pats the bench next to her. Jisoo sighs but sits beside her.

Seungcheol drops onto the bench beside Jeonghan, shaking the whole table. Jeonghan’s looking out at the lake again.

“I see the boys have stopped crying.” Nayoung puts a smug spoon of smug rice in her mouth.

“They’ll cry again later, when the girls aren’t watching.” Jeonghan says. Nayoung chuckles.

“We need a rematch.” Seungcheol says, digging into his rice so forcefully the table shakes.

“Isn’t getting beat once bad enough?” Nayoung asks, mouth still full of rice.

“I vote no more rematch.” Jisoo says.

Nayoung smiles at him. “See, _Jijoo_ knows when he’s beat.”

“Jisoo.” He mutters under his breath.

“Best of 5.” Seungcheol suggests.

“No more.” Jisoo groans.

“I vote no more.” Jeonghan says, still looking out onto the lake. “We’re nearly out of first aid stuff and we’ve got two weeks to go.”

“Oh my god we’re nearly done with this shit.” Nayoung stretches out. “I can’t wait to go home to wifi and air conditioning.”

“Same.” Jisoo agrees.

Seungcheol and Jeonghan scrape at their bowls in silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jisoo's near-death experience with tug-of-war is based on real events. I was on the losing team & I flew for exactly 2.00 seconds before literally eating grass. That was back when I was skinny.


	4. Hurricane.mp3

It’s early in the morning, and Jeonghan wakes up because he’s feeling…cold? He rubs his eyes and puts his glasses on before he realizes that that annoying sound isn’t the fan Nayoung’s hogged to herself, but rain. The fan’s actually off. Maybe Nayoung had woken up, felt cold, and switched it off.

Jeonghan puts on his slippers and a jacket and steps out onto the cabin porch.

He hears this gross squelching noise, and sure enough Seungcheol comes running around the corner, drenched in rain and sweat, humming to himself.

“Hey! Idiot! It’s raining!” Jeonghan calls out.

“I noticed!” Seungcheol shouts back, continuing on his laps around the campground.

Jeonghan pulls up a chair and a bucket and sits, resting his feet on the bucket. The wind is cool for once, and he’s going to enjoy it. And the view. He doesn’t get views like this back in his tiny apartment.

Seungcheol comes back another round, waving at him as he passes by. “Wanna join me?”

“I’ll pass.”

After ten rounds Jeonghan counted and a few he didn’t bother to, Seungcheol slows to a stop in front of the cabin porch. “Do you have any water, or is your cabin full of soju?”

“Shut up.” Jeonghan hisses. “Why, did you guys not bring enough for the whole camp?”

“Nah, I’m just too lazy to go back to our cabin right now.” Seungcheol stretches, and Jeonghan wants to make a new camp rule: No jogging in white t-shirts in the rain in front of other counselors.

Jeonghan goes into the cabin and pulls at his hair, screaming silently before picking up a fresh bottle of water and coming out again.

Seungcheol’s sitting on the edge of the porch, swinging his legs like a kid. Jeonghan throws the water bottle at him, not so he can catch it, just at him. It hits Seungcheol in the back of his head.

“You should change, you’re gonna get sick.” Jeonghan says. Not that I care.

“I don’t get sick.” Seungcheol scoffs before swallowing the entire bottle in one go.

Jeonghan closes his mouth, not realizing it had been open.

Seungcheol gets up suddenly and looks at Jeonghan closely. “I didn’t know you had glasses.”

“I wear contacts.”

“Is that why you don’t swim?”

“I can’t.”

“Wanna learn?”

“From you? No.” Yes.

“Okay.” Seungcheol shrugs. “Where’s your trash bag?”

“In the bathroom. Just give it to me, I’ll throw it.” Jeonghan hopes the other counselor doesn’t notice his fingers twitch away when they touch as Seungcheol hands the bottle over. Seungcheol’s too busy staring at his face to notice, anyway.

“The lights aren’t working.” Nayoung grumbles, standing in the doorway of the cabin.

Jeonghan and Seungcheol take a step away from each other guiltily.

“As in they’re broken? We don’t have extra light bulbs.” Jeonghan steps into the cabin quickly, and Seungcheol follows, while Nayoung studies them both with narrowed eyes.

“These are incandescent bulbs. God, this place is old.”

“It’s fifteen years old.” Seungcheol says.

“The nearest town is an hour away, and I don’t want anyone driving up and down the mountain in this rain.” Nayoung folds her arms.

“Yeah, that’s a bad idea.”

“Eonnie?” The three of them turn around to find a soaked Yuha standing on the porch. “Why is there no electricity?”

 

They have biscuits and spam straight from the can for brunch, because that’s how long it takes for Seungcheol to give up on trying to start a fire using Jeonghan’s schedules.

Jeonghan snatches them back and tries to smooth them out, but Seungcheol’s still trying to read them in the dim light.

“Did you plan the _whole_ summer?” Seungcheol asks. “With _time_?”

“No, the management did. We just follow it. Except when shit like this happens.” Jeonghan smooths another sheet out.

“But what if the kids want to do something else?”

“They don’t.”

“That’s sad.”

“Let’s be real, nobody paying us to make this the _funnest summer ever_ or anything, they just want to get rid of their kids for a month.” Jeonghan arranges the papers by date.

“Screw the parents, then. What about the kids?” Cheol hands Jeonghan a few sheets.

“They’re not complaining. And they learned macramé.”

“Maka- what?”

“Whatever.” Jeonghan straightens out the sheets and sets them back on his bedside table.

“But don’t you want the kids to be happy?” Seungcheol asks, his voice a little lower.

“Sure I do.” Jeonghan’s stressed out. He didn’t realize he’d let Seungcheol into their cabin. Alone. He also didn’t realize that it would bother him this much. But Seungcheol’s too busy looking out the window to realize they’re alone.

“This is my favorite place in the world, and I want it to be theirs too.”

Jeonghan doesn’t know what to say to that.

“I guess.” He says, walking out the door.

_

By the time lunch has rolled around, the kids are bored out of their minds from squeezing into two cabins (5 and 6, the biggest ones) and exhausting all the indoor games they know.

“I wonder how Jisoo and Nayoung are doing in the other cabin,” Jeonghan says, teaching Mingyu how to play cat’s cradle.

“Probably worse.” Seungcheol says, still trying to untangle himself from his one attempt at cat’s cradle. Sungyeon shows up with a pair of scissors and cuts him free. “Thanks, Sungyeon.”

“Jeonghan-oppaaaaa,” Kyulkyung whines, leaning on Jeonghan’s shoulder.

“Yes?”

She bats giant camel eyelashes at him. “I’m bored and it’s getting hot because there are too many people in here.” She looks pointedly at Mingyu and the other boys.

“Well, there’s nothing we can do, it’s raining too hard to do anything else.” Jeonghan says, using his pinkies to pick up two lines of his and Mingyu’s cat’s cradle.

“We could…go out…into the rain.” Seungcheol says, raising his eyebrows.

“No, we’re all going to get sick.”

“And we’ll get wet.” Kyulkyung grimaces.

“It’ll be like swimming, except standing up.” Seungcheol says.

“Ohh…” Kyulkyung nods, and Sungyeon agrees. “Let’s go in the rain!”

“No.” Jeonghan says, louder this time.

“It’ll be fun.” Seungcheol lays his face on the yarn Mingyu and Jeonghan are holding up, and looks up to bat _his_ camel eyelashes at Jeonghan. “Come on, Jeonghan.”

“No.”

“Oppa, please?” Kyulkyung begs.

“No.”

“Oppa, please?” Sungyeon begs.

“No.”

“ _Oppa_ , please?” Seungcheol mimics.

Mingyu laughs and goes, “Oppa, please?”

“Fine, just stop with all the ‘oppa’-ing.” Jeonghan sighs.

Seungcheol shoots him a gummy smile, and Jeonghan wants to knock his teeth in.

 

Jisoo hears laughing and splashing from out the window, and goes to find Hansol pressed against the screen.

“Can I go, too?” He looks up at Jisoo.

Jisoo squints at the members of the other cabin, who are splashing around and singing and dancing in the mud. Of course Seungcheol is there, swinging Sungyeon around, and the little girl is giggling like crazy. This was probably all Seungcheol’s idea. But Jeonghan would never-

Jeonghan’s got little Kyla bouncing on his back as he dances, holding Soonyoung’s hands as he does a frenzied twist in the mud. The bottoms of his light jeans are muddy, and his hair is plastered flat against his face by the rain, but Jeonghan’s smiling. Genuinely.

“I didn’t even know that guy knew how to laugh.” Nayoung and Roa have their faces pressed against the other window.

“He seems too grumpy to voluntarily sign up as a camp counselor. How’d he even end up here?”

“He needed the money.” Nayoung shrugs. “He could’ve been doing much worse, if you’d ask me.”

 

Jeonghan wraps Kyla in a towel, ruffling her hair dry.

“Sorry, dude, I don’t know how to deal with…long hair.” Seungcheol says from where he’s trying and failing to help Sungyeon dry her hair.

“Let me.” Jeonghan wraps Sungyeon’s hair in a perfect towel bun.

Seungcheol’s staring at him like he’s just witnessed a miracle, and Jeonghan just goes, “I used to have long hair.”

“Go straight to the shower, don’t make a mess,” Jeonghan tells Seungkwan and Seokmin, who are covered in so much mud that only the whites of their eyes are clean.

“Is there hot water?” Seungkwan asks.

“No.” Jeonghan realizes. “Just take a quick shower so you don’t get cold. Cheol will get your clothes from your cabin.”

“What did you call me?” Seungcheol asks, leaning on the doorframe as he hands Mingyu a dry towel.

“Seungcheol, can you go get clothes for the boys?” Jeonghan turns to dry Kyla up some more, hiding his flushed cheeks.

“Say the magic word.”

“Please.” Jeonghan says through gritted teeth.

“The other one.”

“Please…Cheol.”

Seungcheol sprints off into the rain happily.

 

Dinner is spam straight from the can again, and the kids just fall asleep on the floors of cabins 5 and 6, wrapped in blankets and jackets.

“Just go to sleep if you’re still hungry.” Nayoung had said, so they did.

Jisoo folds his arms as he uses his feet to gently nudge the boys away from the girls on the floor.

“They’re kids, Jisoo, why do you have to separate them? What the hell could happen?” Nayoung goes, settling down on a space near the door.

“I don’t know, and I don’t want to find out.” Jisoo says, sliding down onto the floor next to her.

“ _We’re_ the ones who shouldn’t be sleeping next to each other.” Nayoung snickers, leaning on Jisoo’s shoulder.

“Uh…”

“Shhh just let it happen.”

In the pitch darkness, Jisoo sighs and says, “…You know I’m gay, right?”

Nayoung laughs and snuggles up to him some more. “Yeah, me too.”

Jisoo sits up, letting Nayoung’s head drop to the floor.

“What?”

 

Seungcheol wakes up to a chorus of sneezing and sniffling. It’s still dark, save for a few flashes of lightning followed by floor-shaking thunder. That’s probably what woke him up, considering he was sleeping on top of a pile of Jeonghan’s schedules on the floor, facing Jeonghan.

“Oppa?” A little voice with a clogged nose says from behind Seungcheol.

He sits up to find Kyla curled into a ball, covering her ears.

“Cad you weg Jeonghan-oppa ub?”

“Why, what do you need?”

“Weg hib ub pwease.”

Seungcheol reaches gingerly across the space to tap what he hoped was Jeonghan’s arm. “Jeonghan, hey. Jeonghan, wake up.”

Jeonghan groans and turns away from him.

“Hey, wake up, Kyla needs something.” Seungcheol starts shaking him.

“Fibe miduts.” Jeonghan mutters, sniffling.

Lightning strikes again, and Kyla jumps into Seungcheol’s back. He can feel her pressing her face into his shirt when the thunder rumbles soon after.

“Are you afraid of the thunder?” Seungcheol asks, turning to the little girl and putting an arm around her.

“No.” She says, but she climbs into his lap and tucks her face in his chest, using him as a human soundproofing…meatshield.

“You know the storms just sound close, but they’re usually plenty of kilometers away.” Seungcheol says, as quietly as he can so he doesn’t wake the others. “You can count how many, so you won’t be scared.”

“How?”

“After you see the lightning, you count how many seconds it takes for the thunder to come. Every second is one kilometer.”

Seungcheol feels Kyla frown.

“I’ll just show you.” He says, waiting for the next lightning to strike. When it does, he starts counting. “One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand, four one thousand, five one thousand…”

“Ten one thousand-” The thunder shakes the floor again, and Kyla pressing into Seungcheol’s chest so hard he’s sure there’s the impression of her little face on his shirt.

“Ten kilomeders?” Kyla asks.

“Yup. That means the storm’s really far away, and we don’t have to be worried about it.”

“No.”

They turn to Jeonghan, who hasn’t moved at all.

“Thad meads da lighdning is far away, but da storm is sdill here.” He mumbles, still mostly asleep.

“Jeonghan, are you sick?” Seungcheol asks.

“No.”

Seungcheol sighs as he lays down beside him, Kyla squeezing in between the two of them. “What’s your favorite word?”

“No.” Jeonghan goes.

Kyla giggles, but is cut off by another strike of lightning. She looks up at Seungcheol before counting, “One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand…”

 

For the next two days Jeonghan’s head feels like it’s going to split open, but he’s got twenty sick kids to think about, so he’s got to keep it together.

Everyone in the cabin but Seungcheol woke up the morning after they went out into the rain with a skull-splitting headache and a clogged nose. He really _didn’t_ get sick. The electricity had come back while they were sleeping, so at least there’s hot water to make soup with, and a refrigerator to keep churning out cold packs for the feverish kids. Cabins 4, 5, and 6 have handmade QUARANTINE signs in multicolored marker and crayon in front of them to keep the healthy kids away.

Jeonghan’s eyelids feel heavy as he pours the last of the cold medicine into a newly-washed medicine cup – Jisoo’s been on nurse duty with him all morning, washing the few medicine cups they had and helping distribute the cold packs.

“I don’t want it.” Seungkwan says, rolling to face away from Jeonghan. “It tastes bad.”

“It’s medicine, if it tasted good people would get addicted to it. Don’t be difficult and drink your damn medicine.” Jeonghan snaps at him, before realizing that Seungcheol was standing behind him. “Please.” He adds.

“No.” Seungkwan goes.

“Seungkwan, it’ll make you feel better.” Seungcheol says, squatting beside Seungkwan’s bed, resting his chin on the sheets. “Just one, come on.”

“He’s gonna need another dose in a few hours-”

“Shh,” Seungcheol hisses at Jeonghan. “Come on Seungkwan, just drink this then you can go back to sleep. For me?”

Seungkwan looks at Seungcheol for a minute, like he’s considering his few options, then says, “Fine.”

“That’s my boy.”

Seungkwan downs the medicine like it’s tequila, slamming the empty cup facedown on the bedside table. He flops onto the bed and goes back to sleep.

“Oh thank god.” Jeonghan mutters, rubbing his temples.

“Hey, are you okay?” Seungcheol asks, gently resting his hands on Jeonghan’s arms, holding him an arm’s length away.

“Great. Just great.” Jeonghan grumbles and pushes past Seungcheol.

“You can pull out the ‘I told you so’ if it makes you feel better,” Seungcheol suggests.

“I fucking told you so.” Jeonghan scrunches his nose. “No, didn’t work.”

“Maybe you should sit down.”

“Where, bitch? Thanks to you we have a cabin full – _Three_ cabins’ worth of sick kids and I have nowhere to even sit the fuck down.” Jeonghan snaps.

“Woah, easy on the language, the kids will-” Seungcheol watches Jeonghan struggle to keep his eyes open, then falter, then drop straight to the floor. “Jeonghan?”

“Jisoo!” Seungcheol calls out, turning Jeonghan over and brushing the hair out of his eyes. His face is a grayish kind of pale. “Jisoo!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm Not Sorry.mp3 by Dean


	5. I Overthink Therefore I Overam

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SEUNGCHEOL CHAPTER!!!
> 
> I felt like being dramatic. Jeonghan’s fine he’s just exhausted. I know that feel, Jeonghan.

“We’re out of cold medicine and need three more cold packs.” Jisoo reads from an itemized list they’d fished out of Jeonghan’s jacket pocket. He looks down at Jeonghan, who’s sniffling in his sleep. Jisoo rolls the other counselor onto his side to help him breathe. “And now I guess we need adult cold medicine too.”

“I can’t believe he didn’t sleep for two days.” Seungcheol says, from where he’s sitting on the edge of Jeonghan’s bed, brushing the latter’s hair away from his face. Not that Seungcheol knows anything about having long hair, but he’s pretty sure it’s hard to sleep with hair in your mouth.

“I haven’t either.” Jisoo says. Seungcheol looks up at him. Jisoo’s eyebags are entire suitcases at this point.

“You should. I’ll take care of the kids.”

“No, you have to drive out into town and buy us- Buy us some more medicine.” Jisoo says, strangling back a yawn.

“Well then, I’ll go out, you sleep, and Nayoung can watch-”

“You already left Nayoung to watch twenty kids on her own.” Jisoo snaps.

“You need to sleep, you’re getting cranky.”

“I’m not one of the kids, Cheol.” Jisoo slams the door behind him.

 

Seungcheol watches Nayoung and all the healthy kids wave at him from his rearview mirror.

“Do you have the list?” Seungcheol asks Jun, who’s sitting in the front row of the bus. Jun waves Jeonghan’s shopping list.

“Here’s the aux cord,” Seungcheol says, holding it out to Jun.

“I don’t have a phone.” Jun says. Seungcheol takes a moment to look at him through the mirror to see if he’s serious. Jun has been known to say all sorts of things.

“Oh. Uh. I’ll play something then.” Seungcheol plugs his phone in and hits play.

A song about drugs plays.

“Oh, not that.”

A song about sex plays.

“Shit, uh,” Seungcheol carefully guides the bus down a winding mountain road, forced to let the song play.

“It’s okay, I’m nearly 11.” Jun says, like that means anything.

“You still shouldn’t be listening to this kinda stuff.” Seungcheol hits the skip button.

A dirtier song about sex plays, and Jun nods to the beat sagely.

 

Seungcheol’s afraid that the kind old lady who runs the town pharmacy thinks he’s a shady person because he bought a whole box of cold medicine, but he’s also afraid that he’s poisoned Jun’s mind with his music, but he’s also afraid that the kids he was supposed to be taking care of might be seriously sick because of him, but he’s also afraid that Jeonghan’s still going to be angry with him when he wakes up.

So he’s confused when Jisoo puts a hand on his forehead when he brings the box of new meds into the camp.

“What are you doing?”

“Checking if you have a fever, cause you look like you have a fever.” Jisoo frowns and presses his forehead against Seungcheol’s. “Nah, you’re fine.”

“What?” Seungcheol backs away, knocking into the bus behind him.

“I was checking your temperature, calm down.” Jisoo picks up the box and opens it with one hand, silently counting its contents. “You look awful. Are you feeling okay?”

“I’ve just been thinking. About things.”

“Well, don’t wrinkle your brain too hard.” Jisoo walks off with the box, leaving Seungcheol to wrinkle his brain over the idea of wrinkling his brain. Is the brain even a muscle?

“Oh hey, you’re back!” Nayoung jogs over. “We’re playing frisbee and we need someone to coach the other team.”

“Okay.” Seungcheol says, his brows still furrowed.

“You okay, Seungcheol?”

“Yeah.”

Nayoung’s halved the twenty kids who didn’t get sick into two teams of ten, mixing the girls with the boys “for the boys’ sake, so they don’t lose so bad.” She steers Seungcheol to the other team, which is already in a huddle.

“So what’s the plan, coach?” Wonwoo asks. He’d been playing coach till Seungcheol arrived, and he doesn’t look that happy to be demoted.

Seungcheol’s brain’s a raisin at this point. What _is_ his plan? What if Jeonghan’s seriously sick and needs to go to a hospital? The nearest hospital’s over an hour away. And what about the kids?

“Seungcheol-oppa.” Rena shakes Seungcheol’s arm. “What’s the plan?”

“Um, get the ball from the other team and score some goals.”

“Ball?” Wonwoo and Rena ask, exchanging looks.

“Frisbee.” Seungcheol corrects himself. What if some of the kids also need to go to the hospital? What if their parents get pissed off? What if they close down the camp?

“Are you okay, oppa?” Yehana asks, tugging on Seungcheol’s sleeve.

“Sure, you can do that.” Seungcheol mumbles. What if they have him arrested or something for getting everyone sick? What if he ends up in jail?

“Okay, he’s not listening to us anymore.”

But what if it wasn’t the rain? Then it wasn’t his fault. What if it was something they ate? If it was, then why wasn’t the other cabin sick? So it was definitely his fault.

“GoooOOO TEAM!” The kids scream, before running out onto the field.

“Yeah. Go team,” Seungcheol says, a few seconds too late.

 

“Has he woken up yet?” Seungcheol enters the dark cabin, wiping his hands on his jeans. He’d just washed an entire camp’s worth of plates and bowls, because Nayoung had insisted that he owed her for leaving twenty kids with her. He knew he was being scammed, but he was willing to help out in any way.

“Yeah, he was awake a while ago. I don’t think he’s even that sick, he’s just being a _lazy ass_.” Jisoo says, leaning to make sure Jeonghan can hear.

“You should sleep, I’ll watch the kids.”

“Really.” The only lights are a few fluorescent ones outside the cabin window, but Seungcheol sees Jisoo look at Jeonghan then look back at him. “You’ll watch the _kids_.”

“Just tell me what I need to do, I’ll do it.” Seungcheol says.

“I’ve already given them their medicine for the night. They should sleep till tomorrow morning.” Jisoo says, stifling a yawn. “Maybe I will too.”

“Good night, Jisoo.”

“Night, Cheol.” Jisoo kicks the bed on his way out, jarring Jeonghan. “Don’t stay up too late.”

Seungcheol sits on the edge of the bed. What if Jisoo’s sick too? Maybe he’s just sleepy. He’s seen sleep-deprived Jisoo, every finals week at university, but he’s never looked _that_ bad. Not that Jisoo looks bad, he always looks really good, he just looks really tired. Jisoo’s really pretty, for a guy. That’s probably why Nayoung keeps hitting on him instead of Seungcheol.

“Are you sleeping sitting up?”

Seungcheol frowns and looks down at Jeonghan, who hasn’t moved an inch.

“How long have you been awake?”

“Go back to your cabin and sleep there.” Jeonghan mutters.

“Okay.”

Seungcheol’s already got the door open when Jeonghan asks, “Where’s Nayoung?”

“Don’t know.”

“Probably harassing Jisoo.”

Seungcheol turns around. “She wouldn’t really, right?”

Jeonghan laughs, still not moving. “No. She’s just messing with him. She has a girlfriend back home.”

“…She likes girls?”

“Do you?”

“Yeah.” Seungcheol’s brain is wrinkled beyond belief. “I guess.”

“Ok.”

Seungcheol’s worried that Jisoo might not know that Nayoung isn’t actually interested in him, but he’s not sure that Jisoo would actually be hurt when he finds out. He’d probably be a little relieved. Jisoo didn’t seem to like her much. Or was that just a front?

“Are you still there?”

“Yeah, sorry, I’m leaving.” Seungcheol tries to open the door as gently as he could, worried that Jeonghan might snap at him if he went around banging all the doors like he usually did.

“Cheol?”

Seungcheol stops in the doorway. “Yeah?”

“I can’t sleep.”

“Does your head hurt? Do I need to get you medicine or anything?” Seungcheol asks, perching on the edge of the bed.

“Get me the bottle of soju from my bag.”

Seungcheol frowns. “Aren’t you not supposed to drink if you took medicine?”

“No, it’s fine. Trust me, I’m taking a pre-med.”

“Well I’m taking nursing and I think-”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jeonghan rolls around to face Seungcheol. “You’re going to be a nurse and you didn’t think we would all get sick if we ran around in the rain like crazy people?”

“It’s not rain that makes people sick, it’s germs and stuff. Right?”

“You’re an embarrassment to the nursing profession.”

“I know I’m stupid, no need to rub it in.” Seungcheol laughs.

Jeonghan sits up, his face close enough that Seungcheol can feel his extra-warm breaths on his face. “Don’t call yourself stupid.”

“I’m the one who got all of you guys sick.” Seungcheol thinks he should move away, but he doesn’t.

“Yeah, it was pretty stupid, but I went with it, so what does that make me?”

“ _You_ are not stupid.” Seungcheol wants to throw Jeonghan out the window. “You know all these constellations and how to save lives and that complicated yarn game- Macramé?”

“Just stop, you’re embarrassing yourself.”

“But you’re so-”

Jeonghan leans forward and plants one extra-warm kiss on Seungcheol’s mouth, which is open. Why is it open.

“Did you just kiss me?” Seungcheol asks, feeling stupid.

“Don’t worry you won’t get sick. Kissing’s good for your immune system.” Jeonghan says quickly.

“But the germs and stuff.”

“Kiss me again, I’ll take them back.” Jeonghan’s face is even prettier up close, even though he’s so close that all Seungcheol can really see if the top of his nose. Jeonghan’s nose is surprisingly small, and cute. “Trust me, I’m taking a-”

“But I like girls.”

“Right.” Jeonghan pulls away. “Right. You just said that. I’m probably high on cold meds or something. Like, what the hell, that came out of nowhere.” Jeonghan lies down, turning to face away from Seungcheol. “Sorry.”

“Good night,” Seungcheol says, opening the door a third time. He waits for Jeonghan to reply, but he doesn’t.

Seungcheol takes extra care to close the door gently behind him.


	6. I pRoMiSeD JeOnGcHeoL & I aLwAyS DeLiVeR

“I was thinking,” Nayoung says to the other counselors as they’re eating breakfast.

“Good to know you’re trying out new things.” Jisoo says, and Nayoung flicks rice into his bangs.

“Anyway,” Nayoung continues. “We should hold a p-a-r-t-y before we all go home.”

“Everyone in the camp can spell the word ‘party,’ Nayoung.” Jisoo says.

“Jijoo, could you let me live for five fucking minutes?”

“Okay, okay, go on. What kind of party?” Jisoo asks. “A birthday party kinda thing with cake and stuff? Cause we don’t have anything except three-week-old bread.”

“I’m just gonna fucking ignore you.” Nayoung turns to Jeonghan, who’s busy studying the lake, and Seungcheol, who’s deeply interested in the clump of trees just off the clearing. “We should have a party and all the kids help cook and make decorations and shit. For the kids.”

Nayoung kicks Jeonghan under the table when nobody says anything.

“We don’t have food for a party.” Jeonghan says. He’s right, but Nayoung isn’t gonna let him win.

“We can buy food.”

“We don’t have money.” Jeonghan says.

“We’ll use my money, then. And the boys still have some left over, right Jisoo?”

“Oh my god you got my name right.” Jisoo claps. “And yeah, we have enough money for party food. What do you think, Cheol?”

“Huh?”

“Party. For the kids. Last day of camp.” Jisoo says slowly, drilling each word into Seungcheol’s skull.

“That sounds good.”

 

“And if you fold it like this, then you just have to cut once instead of twenty times.” Jeonghan cuts the paper then pulls it apart, coming up with twenty perfect triangles for party banners.

Yuha nods and starts folding a large green sheet of paper. Jeonghan looks around the Arts & Crafts cabin to check on all the girls and make sure they’re still cutting paper and not their fingers, and gluing glitter and not their hair.

“Jeonghan-oppa?”

“Yes, Eunwoo?”

“Why is that boy standing at the window?”

Jeonghan looks out the window to find Mingyu looking in like a reverse puppy in the pet shop window. Jeonghan waves at him to come inside, and Mingyu points at himself like, _Me_?

Jeonghan rolls his eyes and makes a more aggressive motion to call him into the cabin.

“What do you wanna make?” Jeonghan asks, dragging up a stool for Mingyu to sit on.

“I’ll just watch.”

As Jeonghan makes his rounds of the cabin, he watches Mingyu’s eyes, which flit from one craft material to another like he’s already got a game plan, so he’s wondering why the kid doesn’t wanna do anything.

“Hey, Mingyu, I need your help with something.”

“What is it?” Mingyu asks brightly.

“I don’t know what to do with these.” Jeonghan dumps a pile of corrugated board, construction paper, felt paper, yarn, and glitter glue in front of Mingyu. “Can you make something?”

“No…this stuff’s for girls.” Mingyu says, pushing the pile away.

Jeonghan sighs, and pulls up a chair next to Mingyu. “I’ve been teaching these kids arts & crafts the whole summer, Mingyu, but am I a girl?”

“No.” Mingyu laughs.

“No. I’m not. A Girl.” Jeonghan unclenches his teeth. “It doesn’t matter if you’re a girl or a boy. What do you want to make?”

“I’m going to make Jisoo-hyung a new guitar.” Mingyu says, picking up a pencil and sketching it out onto a scrap piece of paper.

“Is this okay?” Mingyu asks, holding up his cardboard guitar design.

“Yeah, that’s more than okay.” Jeonghan says. “I think I’ve got little wooden dowels that would be good for that part in the end.”

Jeonghan’s digging around in the box of materials, when Sungyeon approaches Mingyu, he snaps, “Don’t say anything mean or I swear to every god I will cut one of your pigtails off.”

“Mingyu-oppa that’s so cool, are you gonna make that?”

“Yeah.” Mingyu’s proud smile sets something off somewhere in Jeonghan’s chest.

Jeonghan’s suddenly reminded of this scene from this American movie Nayoung had forced him to watch, where the zombie’s heart started beating again because of a puppy. Or something like that.

“Jeonghan-hyung, can Minghao and Hansol make stuff too?” Mingyu asks him.

“Yeah, of course.” Jeonghan pulls up chairs for the boys and reaches into his plastic storage box to dump more art supplies in front of them.

“Can I have some paper too?” Jihoon asks, from where he’s been sitting for the past five minutes, apparently.

“Sure, here you go.” Jeonghan smiles, handing the kid a sheaf of patterned origami paper. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Siyeon struggling with a jar of glitter, and he’s about to help her when it bursts open with a loud POP! and a gentle rain of pink glitter.

“Oops.” She says with a shrug that shakes some glitter onto the floor.

_

“Is anyone still gonna use the kayaks?” Seungcheol asks.

“With this party, I guess not.” Jisoo wheezes in the middle of blowing a balloon. The balloon deflates, and he sighs. “They’re dry enough to load onto the bus already.”

“Okay.”

Seungcheol’s walking over to the where the kayaks are drying upside down, but he sees Jeonghan and casually takes the long way around the picnic tables to get to them. Jeonghan’s busy shaking glitter out of some kids’ hair, assuring them that the grass will eat the glitter like fertilizer, they’re not littering.

Seungcheol carefully picks up one kayak, but it makes this godawful scraping noise that Jeonghan and the kids all turn to look at.

“Oh. Hey.”

“Hey.” Seungcheol says, quickly picking up a second kayak and walking off in the direction of the bus before Jeonghan can say anything else.

Seungcheol checks to see if everyone’s gone before he goes back for the last kayak. He practically runs over and picks it up, ready to sprint back to the bus with a kayak in tow.

“Seungcheol.”

He drops the kayak in surprise, onto his own foot, but he keeps a straight face. Or, at least, he tries to.

“Yeah?” Seungcheol asks, his eye twitching in pain.

“Is your foot okay?” Jeonghan asks.

“Yeah.” Seungcheol waggles his foot.

“Can we talk? Are you okay with that? ‘Cause if you don’t want to-”

“No, it’s okay. I mean, yes.” Seungcheol grimaces and decides on picking up the kayak. “You wanna go out onto the water?”

“I, uh, that’s not what I had in mind, but if you want to…”

 

Seungcheol’s focused on rowing, working really hard to not look at Jeonghan, so much so that they’re already in the middle of the lake before he looks away from Jeonghan and realizes it.

Jeonghan’s got his hands folded in his lap, working really hard to think about not having a life vest so he doesn’t stare at Seungcheol’s arms.

Seungcheol rests the oar on the rim of the boat. “…Did you want to talk about something?”

“Yeah.” Jeonghan says, changing his mind last minute.

Seungcheol waits.

“I just remembered what you said about like, letting the kids be kids and have fun.” Jeonghan says finally. “That’s it.”

“That’s it?”

“Yeah.”

Seungcheol taps the oars while Jeonghan looks desperately at the cabins, far enough that they look like little dollhouses.

“I was ten when I first went here.” Seungcheol says quietly. “It looked really different, like rundown and stuff. I wanted to go home. But you know, when you’re in school and you’re stuck going from class to class and you have all these schedules – No offense.”

“None taken.”

“Well, anyway, it wasn’t like that here. The counselors weren’t like teachers, they let us do stupid things that we wouldn’t learn anything from. We didn’t have to get high grades to prove that we weren’t wasting our time. So for a stupid kid like me-”

“How many times do I have to tell you, you’re not stupid.”

“Okay, for a not-smart kid like me, it was nice to be allowed to do things I was good at, like soccer and climbing trees and tug-o-war, but not as a distraction from school. It was nice that my parents would ask me, ‘Did you have fun?’ Instead of ‘What did you learn at school today?’”

Jeonghan can feel Seungcheol’s giant droopy eyes staring at him so he swallows and looks straight into them. Jeonghan wants a fight, and he doesn’t know why.

“Fun isn’t everything.” He says.

“School isn’t everything either.” Seungcheol’s frown is adorable. “I barely passed all the way through high school and I still got into college anyway.”

“Well, it’s not like that for these kids anymore. You can’t be mediocre, or you’re not gonna get into a good high school, and if you don’t start out in a good high school, then good luck getting into any college. My little sister had to take summer classes this summer instead of going to the camp that _I_ work at.”

“How old is she?”

“Nearly eight.”

“That’s…evil.” Jeonghan’s entertained by how closely knit Seungcheol’s eyebrows are, but he doesn’t disagree.

“Our parents want us to be doctors.” He says.

“Whose parents don’t?”

Jeonghan laughs.

“I wanted to be a doctor.” Seungcheol says. “But I’m not smart enough for that, so-”

“If you call yourself stupid one more time-”

“What, you’ll kiss me again?”

Jeonghan’s ears are bright red. He can _feel_ it. “You know what, maybe I will, if it’ll shut you up.”

Seungcheol looks down at the floor of the kayak. “Sorry. That was rude.”

“You’re pretty insensitive for someone whose best friend is gay.”

Seungcheol frowns, and Jeonghan wants to flip the boat, because the idiot is just now connecting the dots, and at a snail’s pace.

“ _Jisoo_?”

“You honestly didn’t know?”

“What, but he- I’ve known him for years! But- That can’t…” A very small light bulb goes off in Seungcheol’s wrinkled brain. “I’m the only straight one here?”

“Congratu-fucking-lations!” Jeonghan throws up his hands in exasperation.

It’s perfectly fine to be animated and dramatic on land, but Jeonghan actually does flip the boat, in exasperation.

And he can’t swim.

Jeonghan’s scrambling as he floats upward, clawing at the water to get to air, but he realizes he’s been flipped over as well and he’s actually sinking headfirst to the bottom of the lake. He tries to see, but everything is a murky green, and his foot gets caught on something. He tries to kick himself free, but he can’t. He wants to cry, but that would use up all the air he has left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> DrAmA
> 
> feel free to attacc me in the comments or ask me to tag a warning bec i really don't know how to tag, k?


	7. DIS IS IT, IM DONE BEING MEAN, IM A CHANGED B, BEING THE CHANGE I WISH TO B IN THE WORLD

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i really didn't mean to drown anyone 
> 
> -B

“Nayoung, have you seen Seungcheol?”

“He’s probably off finally making out- I mean, up with Jeonghan. What did they even fight about?” Nayoung’s got her fingers crossed. She’s sitting on top of a picnic table, directing the kids who are putting up banners and tying balloons for the party. “A little higher!”

“Woman, this is the highest I can go!” Soonyoung’s already jumping to tie the banners to the tree.

“Nayoung, I’m serious, he left the bus open.” Jisoo’s picking at his nails. “What if something happened to him?”

“Calm down, Jijoo, I’m sure your man can handle himself.”

“He’s not. My man.” Jisoo pulls an entire hangnail off.

“Aw, are you jealous?” Nayoung pouts in his direction. “Yuha, go help Soonyoung out!”

“I’m gonna go look for him.” Jisoo says, walking off.

“You’re still his first love!” Nayoung calls after him, snickering.

Jisoo’s already circled and checked every cabin, when he remembers the kayaks. He goes to the place they set them out to dry and finds that one of them has been dragged into the water. Stupid Seungcheol. Jisoo sighs before squinting out into the water. It’s getting a bit dark, and he can’t really see the other side of the lake.

He hears a very faint, round noise like a howl, and runs out onto the pier. Sure enough, there’s a capsized kayak in the middle of the lake, and two small meaty arms desperately waving around.

Jisoo throws his shirt aside as he kicks his shoes off, before diving into the water. He’s a little out of practice, because he’s just been bobbing around the kids all summer, but he tears through the water, only taking a breath every second stroke.

“JI-!” Seungcheol shouts, before dipping under the surface.

Jisoo reaches out and grabs Seungcheol, hugging him tightly under one arm.

“JISOO!”

“Shh, close your mouth.” Jisoo starts turning them around to swim back to shore while he’s still on an adrenaline rush, but Seungcheol all but slaps him in the face.

Seungcheol tries to shout something, but it makes no sense to Jisoo.

“What?” Jisoo’s kicking and pulling with his free arm like crazy to keep himself and Seungcheol – who is likely double the weight of the practice victims at all his lifeguard training classes – afloat and moving towards the shore.

“-STILL! THERE!” Seungcheol waves a hand at the general direction of the overturned kayak.

“We’ll get it later!”

“JEONGHAN!” Seungcheol shouts, his face getting red with the effort of craning keeping his mouth above the water.

It takes Jisoo a whole minute to understand what Seungcheol means, but by then it’s too late to turn back.

“Can’t carry both-” Jisoo’s getting exhausted. He’s got to stop talking, but Seungcheol’s freaking out. “Both of you!”

“ _JEONGHAN_!” Seungcheol shouts, angrier and louder this time.

“I can’t!” Jisoo shouts back, moving Seungcheol from one exhausted arm to the other.

Seungcheol’s shouting incoherent syllables at this point, tears streaming steadily out of his eyes. Jisoo’s crying too, and he can’t really tell where he’s going and hopes he’s still going towards the shore.

 

“Eonnie, where are Jisoo-oppa and Jeonghan-oppa?” Kyulkyung asks.

Nayoung flips the barbecue before looking up. Where the hell were they? “I don’t know.”

“Also Seungcheol-oppa, he’s missing too.”

“Have you checked the cabins?” Nayoung asks, before it dawns on her that maybe two or more (?) of those idiots are doing something she doesn’t want the kids to see. “Mingyu!”

“Yes, noona?”

“Make sure to take the pork off the grill before it burns, I’m just going to look for the other counselors.” She turns to Kyulkyung. “You’re in charge of the other kids, make sure no one dies while I’m gone.”

“ _All_ of them???” Kyulkyung makes a face.

“Got it, noona.” Mingyu says, rolling up his jacket sleeves as he picks up the tongs.

Nayoung’s gone through every darkened cabin, shouting, “Stop whatever you’re doing, I’m coming in!” before entering each one, only to find that they were all empty, save for a guilty Roa eating candy from a stash she’d hidden from the others all summer.

“JISOO!” She shouts, running onto the beach, where Jisoo – only in shorts and socks – is dragging Seungcheol – who’s chortling on water but trying to say something – out of the water.

“What the hell happened here?” She catches Jisoo as his knees give way, letting Seungcheol fall onto the sand with a crunch.

“Cheol. Went. Kayak. But. Can’t. Swim.” Jisoo heaves out each word with one breath.

“Oh my god. Just,” Nayoung gently lowers Jisoo onto the beach. “Just chill out, okay? Have you seen Jeonghan?”

Jisoo and Seungcheol point at the lake.

“JEONGHAN CAN’T SWIM!” Nayoung screams at them.

Jisoo shakes his head.

The kids have started to flock towards all the screaming, catching Nayoung as she dives into the lake.

“What’s going on?” Seungkwan asks.

“We have to help them,” Minghao points at Jisoo and Seungcheol lying in the sand.

They, along with four of the other boys and three girls, manage to drag the two counselors to the grass. Jun goes running to get them dry towels, and comes back to find a ring of kids screaming around Seungcheol attacking Jisoo.

“-HOW COULD YOU LEAVE HIM THERE!”

“I COULDN’T BRING BOTH OF YOU, WHAT WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO?”

“YOU COULD’VE LEFT ME!”

“AS IF I WOULD DO THAT!” Jisoo tries to roll out of Seungcheol’s reach. “YOU SHOULDN’T HAVE GONE OUT ONTO THE WATER IF NEITHER OF YOU COULD SWIM! IDIOT!”

Seungcheol tries to throttle Jisoo, but two small white hands hit him in the face. It’s Hansol.

“No hitting!” Hansol shouts, beating on Seungcheol with his fists until the latter lets Jisoo go. “No! Hitting!”

Seungcheol starts laughing, and Jisoo can’t believe him, but realizes he’s laughing too. Hansol starts crying.

 

Nayoung comes up for air for a few seconds, before diving into the murky water again.

She can’t really see anything, so she’s just waving her hands around until she feels something vaguely like a tall, skinny guy.

She doesn’t.

“Goddammit!” She shouts as she goes up for air, her legs starting to ache as she treads water. “Fucking Jeonghan!”

She’s about to dive for the tenth or eleventh time when she hears a hollow clunking noise.

Nayoung slowly kicks her way to the overturned kayak, which she knocks on. Twice.

It knocks back. Twice.

Nayoung takes a breath, then dips under the water, surfacing under the kayak’s hull. It’s pitch dark, but Nayoung can feel someone breathing into her face.

“Oh thank god,” Jeonghan pants, hanging from the benches. “My arms are about to give out. And I think I’m running out of oxy-”

Nayoung hugs him, then catches him as his hands lose their grip on the kayak.

They stagger back onto the shore, Nayoung supporting Jeonghan’s entire weight as he’s got an arm around her shoulders. “-never do that again, okay? No dick is worth nearly dying.”

“Nayoung, _please_.”

Jeonghan remembers some American book that Nayoung had made him read where the main character said that he fell in love like a drizzle or a hurricane or something like that – Slowly, then all at once. That was how the kids, who had been crying in a circle around Seungcheol and Jisoo, came running towards Nayoung and Jeonghan. First it was Kyla, who goes straight to hug one of Jeonghan’s legs, then Mingyu, who tucks his face in Jeonghan’s chest, then Eunwoo, who’s just screaming, then Kyulkyung, then Sungyeon, then the entire camp in one giant, clammy group hug.

“Help I can’t breathe,” Chan protests, caught somewhere in the middle.

 

The party, Nayoung insists, must go on, so it does.

The kids forget about nearly being orphaned as they dance to the questionably rude music Seungcheol plays from his phone, and stuff their faces with Mingyu’s perfectly crispy barbecue, and scream as they play some cruel balloon-popping game Siyeon invented.

Most of the younger kids are asleep when Nayoung announces that it’s curfew for _everyone_ , but they all get up and trudge to their cabins in a never-before-seen show of obedience.

“We can clean this up tomorrow, no one’s gonna care.” Nayoung says, stopping Jeonghan from picking up some paper plates off the ground.

“I care. I’m not gonna let this place become a dump.” Jeonghan says, bending over to pick up some more plates.

“Jeong- Seungcheol!” Nayoung shouts, catching him washing pots and pans by the edge of the picnic area.

“Yeah?”

“Leave it. We’ll clean up tomorrow before we go.” Nayoung grabs the sponge from him. “Jisoo, control your man!”

“Not even gonna try,” Jisoo yawns. “I’m going to bed, I probably won’t be able to move tomorrow, good night, guys.”

“Good night.” Jeonghan says, dragging a garbage bag as he picks up the popped balloons.

“’Night.” Seungcheol says, scrubbing a pan with his bare hands.

“I give up I’m going to bed.” Nayoung throws the sponge at Seungcheol. “Nobody goes back into the fucking lake or I’ll kill you myself, got it?”

“Yup.”

“Good night.”

 

Seungcheol’s switching off the lanterns they’d put up for the party one by one, a flashlight held between his teeth.

“If you can’t swim either,” Jeonghan says from behind him, tying up a garbage bag. “Then what were you offering to teach me?”

Seuncheol switches off the last lantern. “Honestly? I don’t know. I can’t really control what I say around you.”

“You don’t control what you say around anybody.” Jeonghan rolls his eyes, but nobody sees it.

“That’s not true. I don’t say bad words in front of the kids.”

Jeonghan laughs and takes the flashlight out of Seungcheol’s mouth.

“Don’t put that in your mouth, it’s dirty.” Jeonghan wipes the flashlight on the hem of his shirt. “You’re like a kid, you need to be told all this basic-”

Seungcheol kisses Jeonghan quickly. Actually he knocks his teeth into his, but the intention is there.

Jeonghan lifts one eyebrow. “I’m not a girl.”

“I know.” Seungcheol shrugs. “But I don’t like all girls, just a few of them. Maybe I don’t like all boys, just a few, too.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Do you care if it does?”

“No.” Jeonghan puts the flashlight down on a table and cups Seungcheol’s small chin in his hands, bending down a little bit to kiss his nose.

Seungcheol laughs. “You missed.”

“You’re too short.” Jeonghan kisses right below his nose this time.

“You only noticed now?” Seungcheol backs up and sits on the picnic table.

“I only noticed now.” Jeonghan grabs Seungcheol by the thighs to pull him closer.

“What star is that one?” Seungcheol asks, looking up as Jeonghan peppers a line of kisses down his neck.

“Fuck if I know.” Jeonghan mutters into Seungcheol’s collarbone.

“ _Language_.” They say at the same time, in their best impressions of Nayoung and Jisoo.


	8. Bye Bye Bye

Jeonghan locks the last cabin. He goes over the whole ring of keys, checking against the notes on his phone.

“We’ll return the keys to the management.” Jeonghan tells Jisoo, pocketing them. “But if anything’s broken or missing, it’s your camp’s fault.”

“Bitch.” Jisoo says, handing over the keys to cabin 8.

The bigger bus honks its horn impatiently.

“Hurry up Jeonghan, we need to make it back by two!” Nayoung shouts through the door. She turns to looks at the girls. “Pee now or forever hold your pee.”

 

“Head count!” Seungcheol shouts over the rediscovered megaphone. Jisoo hops aboard and starts counting the kids silently.

“Someone’s missing.” Jisoo says, and Seungcheol has exactly four mini-heart attacks.

“Mingyu.” Jihoon reports, already listening to music and looking out the window.

Someone knocks on the open door of the bus. It’s Jeonghan, and Mingyu’s behind him.

“Sorry. I forgot something in cabin 7.” Mingyu says, climbing aboard with his hands behind his back.

“We weren’t even _in_ cabin 7.” Jisoo frowns.

Mingyu holds out the cardboard guitar he made, which sheds a few pink glitters with every movement. “I forgot to give it to you at the party last night because…yeah.”

Jisoo stares at it for a very long time.

“You’re supposed to take it, Jisoo.” Seungcheol whispers.

“Why? You don’t like it?” Mingyu asks, starting to take the guitar back.

“No.” Jisoo’s face gets really red and scrunched up. “Fuck you man, I love it.”

He pulls Mingyu in for a hug.

“You’re crushing it.” Mingyu squeaks.

“Oh. Sorry.”

Seungcheol notices Jeonghan looking at him and using his nose to kind of call him over.

“I’ll just, uh, I’ll be a minute.” Seungcheol says. “Does anyone else need to pee? You should pee now, we’re not gonna be able to take a lot of stops.”

Jeonghan drags Seungcheol behind the back of their bus, where nobody can see them, and proceeds to smash his face against Seungcheol’s.

“Whoa, calm down.” Seungcheol says, gasping for air.

Seungcheol freezes in place as Jeonghan’s hands travel down his torso and into his pants pocket.

Jeonghan holds up Seungcheol’s phone, typing furiously into it. “This is my number. Call me when you get home.”

“Where do you go to university?” Seungcheol asks. “We could-”

“Call me. I’ll tell you everything.” Jeonghan waves the phone in his face. “I don’t want you text me ‘Hey’ or ‘What’s up.’ Call me.”

“Okay, okay,” Seungcheol gets his phone back.

Jeonghan grabs the back of Seungcheol’s short hair and pulls him in for another kiss. This one lasts so long, Seungcheol feels like he’s drowning all over again. But in a good way. Kinky.

Nayoung seems to be stomping on the horn, and Seungcheol’s starting to feel faint from the lack of oxygen, so Jeonghan lets him go. “I have to go. I’m back to following schedules.” He laughs, before saying,

“Call me.” Jeonghan stares directly into Seungcheol’s eyes like he’s trying to burn holes into them. “Call me call me call me-”

“Yeah, I-”

Jeonghan kisses Seungcheol on the nose one last time. “Call me.”

“I _will_!”

 

Seungcheol watches all the girls sticking their hands and faces out the windows to say goodbye to the boys, who are doing the same. Even Eunwoo blows a kiss, and all the boys scream, “Gross!”

“Are we ready to go?” Jisoo asks.

“Yeah, wait I gotta fix something.” Seungcheol pulls his phone out of his pocket. “FUCK!”

“Cheol-hyung said a bad word.” Jun says, shaking his head.

“What is it? Did you forget something?” Jisoo asks, looking over Seungcheol’s shoulder.

“I must’ve butt-deleted the last three digits of Jeonghan’s number.” Seungcheol knocks his forehead into his phone. “I’m so stupid.”

“At least you only have to try every possible last three digits. Imagine if you’d deleted the whole thing.” Jisoo says, strapping himself in.

“I’d have died of stupidness.” Seungcheol flops into the driver’s seat.

“Stupidity.” Jisoo corrects him. “And I worked way too damn hard to save your life, don’t go throwing it around over pretty boys’ phone numbers.”

“Stupid stupid stupid.” Seungcheol mutters, starting the bus. They drive through the arch, ripping the last of the stars hanging from the _Pristin Summer Camp For Girls_ sign.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if the Pristin bus is bigger, then it should have ripped the stars off the arch too, right? No, because Jeonghan is a good driver. I thought about that.


	9. Epilogue

“You missed the turn, oppa.”

“I know.” Jeonghan says, turning again.

“Now we’re going the wrong way.” His little sister cranes her neck. Her carseat isn’t high enough for her to see exactly where they’re going. “I’m going to be late for my summer class!”

“What if you didn’t go at all?” Jeonghan looks at her through the rearview mirror. “Do you wanna go to the park? Or the beach?”

“Really?” Her face brightens up. Her brother’s never nice to her, except when it’s her birthday, and it isn’t her birthday, but she’ll take it. “Oh, but Eomma’s going to get mad.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll say it was my idea. Where do you want to go?”

Jeonghan’s little sister tucks her hair behind her prominent, round ears, and thinks. “The park is too near the house, so I can go there any time. I want the beach.”

“Good choice.” Jeonghan lets one hand off the wheel to give her a thumbs up.

“What are we going to do at the beach, oppa?”

“Whatever you want, Tzuyu.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand we're done! Thanks to everyone for the nice comments I live for Online Validation :)) Special shoutout to averyblue (hindi ko ibubulgar yung totoo mong pangalan) for listening to me scream about this fic when it was just a Concept. Hope this makes ur shitty day at work better, hugs & kisses <3 <3 <3
> 
> \- B
> 
> Also yes, that is Twice's Tzuyu. She and Jeonghan have the same resting bitch face.


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